Climate Activists Must Organize Like It's 2099

Though Donald Trump's Black Friday release of the Fourth National Climate Assessment (FNCA) completely backfired-the media relentlessly covered the report, and with devastating detail-Trump nevertheless managed to escape being held to account for what is (arguably) the Assessment's most damning observation:

"Current trends in annual greenhouse gas emissions, globally, are consistent with RCP8.5."

What does this mean?

We cannot survive such a world.

RCPs, or "Representative Concentration Pathways," are "possible scenarios" scientists use to "evaluate the implications of different climate outcomes and associated impacts throughout the 21st century," as the FNCA notes. RCP8.5 is the highest scenario, meaning that it "represents a future where annual greenhouse gas emissions increase significantly throughout the 21st century before leveling off by 2100."

In other words, RCP8.5 is the worst possible scenario. It describes a world in which the global annual temperature will be, by the end of this century, 9degF higher (or more) than it is today.

We cannot survive such a world.

Trump was not held to account for the FNCA's claim-or, rather, for what the claim suggests about his pro-fossil fuel environmental policies-because it was widely overlooked in news reports and FNCA "take-aways." Consequently, when the White House bemoaned the fact that the report was "largely based on the most extreme scenario," the media, the administration's critics, and even scientists typically offered the retort that the Assessment addresses other scenarios; that it was properly vetted; and, that RCP8.5 was just one possible future we are facing.

In other words, not one mention of the fact that current trends are consistent with the worst case scenario, trends to which we are contributing significantly.

According to research recently published by the Global Carbon Project, the world "is on pace to release a record 37.1 gigatons of planet-warming emissions in 2018, led in large part by China, the United States and India." Moreover, our nation's emissions "are expected to rise 2.5 percent this year."

It will unfold, inexorably, through one deregulation after another, one fossil fuel tax break and subsidy after another, one pro-coal conference and promotion after another, until the water inundates our coastal cities, the pollinators die off, the aquifers dry up, and our food supply runs out.

The environmental policies of the Trump administration-as well as those championed by many state governments-are nothing less than RCP8.5 in the making. In fact, given that these policies have been formulated in the context of an overwhelming scientific consensus concerning climate change, they are an intentional production of accelerating species extinction, extreme weather, climate migration, climate-related social and economic inequalities, water and food scarcity, sea level rise, ecosystem collapse, climate change related illnesses, disease, and death, ocean dead zones, and polluted air.

They are policies at war with all life on earth.

We could say, then, that RCP8.5 is here and now.

And why not? After all, that "extreme scenario" the White House complained about is not something that will appear suddenly, out of thin air, in the year 2100. No, it will unfold, inexorably, through one deregulation after another, one fossil fuel tax break and subsidy after another, one pro-coal conference and promotion after another, until the water inundates our coastal cities, the pollinators die off, the aquifers dry up, and our food supply runs out.

Of course, even as we are in the process of creating a RCP8.5 world, that world is not inevitable. It is not our fate because we can change course.

But for that to be true, not only must we resist and organize; we must also do both like its 2099.